Ate my first grass-fed beef today..

[Wolf]

I actually found some organic, 100% grass-fed, 85/15 ground beef at Trader Joe's.. it's the only grass-fed beef I have been able to find, unless you count steaks that said the cows were fed a "100% organic vegetarian diet" but what does that mean?  And what does it mean if the cows are free-range?  I bought a pound of the ground beef though, and ate a little over half of it raw.  The store that has it is about 10 - 11 miles from my house, though, kinda far..

It was pretty mushy though, I don't think I like ground beef all that much, and my stomach's been feeling weird having so much mushy and un-solid food in it.. like raw eggs and raw ground beef and fruit and milk.. I'm hoping that some good solid chunks of meat will feel more solid in my stomach than all this, whenever I can get around to buying some.  Or is it a bad thing for your food to feel solid in your stomach?  It's probably a lot easier for my body to digest all this mushy food, but I still like the feeling of a solid meal in my stomach.

The meat was also kinda cold, and I think that was bit off-putting, along with the mushyness.. Do you guys eat your raw meat cold?  if not, then how do you warm it up?  Just leave it out on the counter until it's room temperature?  If so, it doesn't get spoiled or high by doing that?  What are some things that might spoil the meat?

[MoonStalkeR]

I think 100% vegetarian diet means no animal products, so grains must have been fed.

I don't eat cold meat because of hypersensitivity to cold. I also think it digests better warm, especially early on. What I do is either leave it out at room temperature or put it my gas oven (inactive of course) where the air is warm. It doesn't get spoiled, but dries slightly. You might want to shape patties out of the ground meat and leave them out, it forms a "crust" on the outside and is more appetizing.

[Wolf]

bleh, grain.

and a crust sounds kinda gross actually.  >~>;

[MoonStalkeR]

It's not exactly a crust. It turns it into a firmer shape and makes ground meat less boring to eat.

[Wolf]

Well the ground beef seems quite a bit easier to eat after having warmed up, and after the surface turned a bit brown after sitting out.

does the brown mean it's slightly high?  or does it take a lot longer to start becoming high (or not even become high at all) even if it's been completely open-air rather than in a sealed jar?

[maxscan]

I think 'high' takes quite a bit longer - several weeks potentially, depending on temperature - if it's exposed to the air it dries a bit like a ham or something...

I tend to take mine out of the fridge for a couple of hours before eating. I just leave it on the counter with one of those mesh screens over it to stop any flies or whatever.

A couple of hours, even an hour, is usually enough for it to warm so it tastes good and that length of time doesn't really dry it out at all - at least with steaks etc. I think maybe ground or thinly sliced beef might dry out a bit quicker but then it wouldn't take as long to warm up either (thinner, more surface area)

[Wolf]

So the brown colour could just be that it's dried out rather than high?  The brown part does have a bit of a stronger taste to it, a taste that was usually very off-putting in the few pieces of grain-fed meat that I experimentally ate raw when I was younger but doesn't taste so bad in this grass-fed beef, and isn't really that dry though.

It's been out in open air for more than a couple hours, though.  >>;

[miles]

I get mine from the store, put it in the fridge, and later the same day, take it out and eat it pretty much straight away. My fridge is only on like 2/6 setting though(6/6 being the coldest)... I dunno if Americans have their fridges really cold?

[Wolf]

Well, my dad keeps the fridge so cold that sometimes things end up freezing in there.  >~>;
plus I can't keep my meat in the fridge because my dad would freak if he know I was eating raw meat.. so I pretty much have to buy smaller amounts of meat and eat it all as fast as I can before it goes bad.

[dsohei]

can you obtain a mini-fridge, or at least large cooler... there are many types.
and it seems like your first order of business is to become more free. no ones opinion is meant to control another persons free will.

[klowcarb]

I like my raw ground beef or raw steaks cold out of the fridge, with bone marrow. Try air-drying your ground beef like I do before you eat it. It takes away a little of the moisture and the texture improves. I just do a day.

[Wolf]

I think I'd probably like my meat best blood-warm fresh from the cow.. too bad we can't just go around killing cows when we're hungry.   

the ground beef was a lot easier to eat once it was warmer and been out in open-air for a little while, with the outside of it having become brown (but not too dry) and also stronger tasting.

I also ate some raw chunks of beef today, and they felt oh-so-much more solid in my stomach, it was a lot better, and delicious too.